


For the Fairest

by Corycides



Category: Revolution (TV)
Genre: Gen, hiatus prompt - Freeform, prompt
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-08-18
Updated: 2013-08-18
Packaged: 2017-12-23 23:03:43
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,770
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/932127
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Corycides/pseuds/Corycides
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>What if Miles never fled the Republic? How would that change Charlie's quest?</p>
            </blockquote>





	For the Fairest

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Steph_Schell](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Steph_Schell/gifts).



Everywhere was different. Georgia fought the hardest, every inch of blood soaked with blood, and Texas fought the dirtiest. Now that it was over though, Charlie had to admit it - Californians bent the neck the prettiest. Glitter and glamour; champagne and tables groaning with fish and fruit; pretty girls and boys in not very much trotted out for the Generals amusement.

You’d almost think surrender was their idea.

It was against rules and regulations, but after the third round of ‘grateful to the Republic’ speeches Charlie slipped out. She kicked her shoes off, leaving them on the flagstones, and walked down the beach in bare feet. Sand itched between her toes and the ocean was flat and black under the low, winter moon.

These days she didn’t about it often, but tonight the words ‘at home’ kept sneaking into her brain. At home she’d be out in the forest with her axe, collecting enough firewood to see them through the cold month. The pot of broth on the fire would be more beans and roots than meat, as game got thin and spare. The sea was something she’d only seen in postcards and daydreams.

To think, once upon a time the only thing she’d wanted in the world was to get back there.

Instead here she was, on the other side of the world. The only world that mattered.

‘Sea to shining sea,’ she quoted quietly, shaking her head. ‘He did it.’

The explosion hit her in the back seconds before she heard it, heat and pressure shoving her forwards into the sea. She tripped in the wet, shifting sand, ending up on her hands and knees in the surf, ears rattling from the noise.

What the fuck-

She shook her head, thick hair winding out of its clips and ribbons to fall over her shoulders, and sat back. Ribbons of dark, slick blood ran down her arms, but nothing hurt. Of course, no-one would go to this much trouble to kill her.

Charlie scrambled to her feet, skirts sodden with sea-water and blood dripping from her fingers, and ran back towards the party. Glass and hot embers crunched underfoot, jabs of pain through her feet, as she forced her way through the crowd. Everyone else was trying to get out, shoving and scrambling over the dead and injured. A blister-faced militia soldier staggered into her, carried along with the mob.

She grabbed a handful of his shirt and yanked him back, shaking him until his glazed eyes focused on her.

‘Stop the Californians leaving,’ she snapped. Then she thought better of it. ‘Stop everyone leaving. Where’s the Generals?’

Blankness turned to a sort of sullen anger. ‘Who the hell are you to give orders?’

‘Captain Matheson,’ she said. She knew she should have worn her uniform instead of this stupid patchwork of lace and silk. ‘Now do as you’re told.’

The Matheson name did its usual magic. The soldier pulled himself up straight, fear sliding under his face, and did as he was gold. He started grabbing the fleeing Californians, barking orders. Charlie left him to it and scrambled in - yelling orders at any Republic uniform she saw.

None of them were worn by her uncle or Monroe.

Shit. Shit. Shit.

She was still bleeding. Charlie reached over her shoulder and fumbled at her back. It hurt for the first time as her fingers bumped against a splinter the thickness of her finger. She didn’t know whether it was a better idea to pull it out or leave it in - but she bit her tongue and yanked it out anyhow.

Dropping it to the ground she made herself over to the last place she’d seen them. They were on the ground - Monroe pinned under a table and Miles lying in a puddle of blood. Charlie dropped to her knees next to him - holding her fingers over his mouth. Breath tickled them and his pulse, when she checked it, was thready but steady under her fingers.

She fumbled at his chest and shoulders, looking for injuries. Nothing. Just a gash in the back of his head, bleeding like a pig. Charlie scrambled over to Monroe next. Blood dribbled from his nose, slick over his lips, and his breathing was ragged and shallow.

Charlie the edge of the table, bloody fingers sliding against the wood, and heaved. Pain seared her shoulder, the muscle ripping from bone, and she hardly shifted the slab of wood.

‘The Generals are injured,’ she yelled. ‘Get some help over here!’

It seemed to take forever before anyone came to help.

* * *

 

Her hunch had been right. The threat was closer to home than the Californians. Nora sat on the narrow bed in the makeshift jail, elbows braced on her knees and hair hanging in thick curls over her face. Her hands were chained together with rough-cast iron cuffs and stiff bars.

‘Why?’ Charlie asked.

Nora looked up. She had a black eye and split lip courtesy of Charlie’s fist, but she still looked...kind. They’d been friends. Charlie thought they’d been friends.

‘You know why, Charlie,’ she said. ‘You know what they’ve done.’

‘They brought order to-’

‘They killed your father.’

Charlie stiffened. That still hurt. No matter what she learned, no matter how many justifications she accepted - he’d been her Dad, and she’d loved him. Love didn’t change the facts, though.

‘It was an accident. Even if it wasn’t - my father was a war criminal. Just like my mother.’

She saw from the twist of Nora’s mouth that she’d headed that jibe off at the pass. Nora sat up straight, brown eyes steady and challenging.

‘And your brother?’ she asked.

Charlie swallowed and licked her lips, but she didn’t look away. ‘Danny was never strong,’ she said. ‘Even the Rebels can’t blame the Generals for pneumonia.’

There was pity on Nora’s face now. Charlie had to resist the urge to blacken her other eye.

‘Charlie, look what they’ve done to you,’ Nora said. ‘What happened to the girl who walked 1000 miles on her own to challenge the founders of the Republic?’

‘She was a child, who didn’t know anything,’ Charlie said coldly. ‘You’ve been with Uncle Miles for years, he loves you.’

‘He’s a monster,’ Nora said. ‘Monsters aren’t capable of love.’

‘He loves me.’

‘Does he?’

Charlie glanced over her shoulder at the guards, ordering to hold their ground with a tip of her head. She went over to the bed and sat down, putting her hand on Nora’s arm.

‘More than he loves you,’ she said. ‘More than anyone else does. Goodbye, Nora.’

She stood up and got out of the way so the guards had a clear shot. The retort made her flinch, but she felt...nothing. Nora had been her best friend - her first friend in the alien world of the capital - but she’d tried to kill the only family Charlie had left.

Well, there was Rachel. She didn’t count for much these days though. Most of the time she seemed to resent Charlie for surviving that bad winter when Danny didn’t. Luckily she’d already given over the pendants by then. Charlie believed Miles loved her, she wasn’t sure he loved her more than power.

‘Wrap her up in the sheets, put her somewhere cold,’ Charlie said. ‘Miles might want to see her.’

* * *

 

He didn’t.

‘You made the right call,’ he said, leaning gingerly on the desk. ‘She was a traitor.’

Charlie tilted her head in acceptance of the praise and relaxed out of her stiff post, shoulders loosening enough that the hot burn in her shoulder was just sore and not agony.

‘How’s General Monroe?’ she asked, trying to sound...appropriately concerned.

Miles gave her an old-fashioned look. ‘Recovering. He’s not as young as he was, to just walk off a collapsed lung.’

Heat threatened her cheeks, but she ignored it.

‘She had to have help,’ she said. ‘The ingredients, placing the bomb...’

‘We’ll find them,’ Miles said. He lowered himself into his chair and she poured him a glass of whiskey passing it over the table. ‘There was a time you’d have cheered her on,’ he said.

Charlie paused, fingers still on the glass over him, and shook her head. ‘She brought that up too.’

Miles twisted the glass away from her and leaned back in the chair, sipping slowly. ‘I remember when you first got to Philly; you were so righteous.’

‘Stupid,’ Charlie corrected. ‘I didn’t know...didn’t know anything. I didn’t even know you were my Uncle.’

Amusement twisted his mouth. ‘The name didn’t give you a clue?’

‘Stupidly enough,’ Charlie said. Her scraped up feet were sore, so she sat down without asking. *n‘I thought my father might have mentioned it.’

‘You wanted your brother back, and you’d give me the pendant.’

‘Only mother had already given you all the pendants.’

Miles grinned and tried to hide it behind a glass. ‘Your face. So...cock-blocked.’

‘It was my only bargaining chip, I thought you were going to kill me. Instead, you asked me to stay.’

‘I always liked a good hostage.’

Charlie looked at her knees, picking at the rough seam with short nails. ‘And because of mom,’ she said. It had been three years and this had gone unsaid, but... ‘Because you could be my father.’

‘Ben was your Dad.’

‘I know. I loved him,’ Charlie said. ‘I love you too, though.’

‘He’d said I’d ruined you,’ he said. ‘Made you a killer.’

‘I was a killer by the time I got to Philadelphia,’ Charlie said. ‘Otherwise I’d be dead. This isn’t Dad’s world. It’s yours. Ours.’

Miles nodded and toasted her with his glass. ‘I’m proud of you, Charlie. You’re a good soldier.’

She smiled.

He leaned his head back and closed his eyes, mouth turning down at the corners. ‘Now go see Bass before you explode.

* * *

 

‘General Monroe,’ Charlie said, closing the door carefully behind her.

He cracked one bright blue eye to squint at her. ‘You aren’t usually so formal in the bedroom, kitten.’

She shrugged. ‘I wasn’t sure...’

He held out his arm. Charlie crawled onto the bed, careful of his bandages, and kissed his bruised lips. Bass twisted his hand in her hair.

‘None of this was your fault, kitten,’ he said. ‘It was my idea to let the plot play out. Otherwise, he might have picked her. I just misjudged when they were going to detonate the fucking bomb.’

Charlie traced her fingers over his chest and his ribs, finding the bruises. ‘I thought you were dead.’

‘I won’t leave you, Charlie,’ he promised. ‘Now, neither of us will.’

  
  
  
  
  
  
  


 


End file.
